


tweek and the goth kids

by sam_suffers



Category: South Park
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Friendship, M/M, Underage Smoking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:07:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26226124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sam_suffers/pseuds/sam_suffers
Summary: The Goth kids get banned from their typical diner hangout and go to the only other place in town, Tweek Bro's Coffee House, albeit reluctantly.Michael in particular is not happy about itInspired by @/noogats art on tumblr (it's cute)
Relationships: Craig Tucker/Tweek Tweak
Comments: 12
Kudos: 176





	tweek and the goth kids

**Author's Note:**

> look man, i have no idea why this is this long, words just happen??? im tired idk, read the thing. btw i know that tweek only says micheal in the fight cuz matt and trey forgot that there was a character named that but shhhhh forget that, forgettttttt it <3 
> 
> there might be some inconsistencies since i rewrote it a lot, wrote when tired over a few says and cba to read it, IM TIREDDDD
> 
> (wuvvvvvvvv you baby,,, sorry its so long and meander-y)

“Ugh I am not happy about this” Michael kicked the curb as him and his friends stood outside of Tweak Bro’s Coffee House.

“Ya, this is going to be worse than Christmas day with my parents,” dragging on the cigarette in her hand, Henrietta continued, “but it’s not like we have anywhere else to go since that dumb bitch banned us from the dinner.”

“Nazi conformist scum,” Firkle spat, they’d all hated that diner and the woman who served them, she always nagged them to order food or leave but they never did, keeping up a steady stream of black coffee instead.

The diner had slowly picked up business over the last few years, at first it had been a quiet area for them to hangout but then the vampire kids started coming in, then, as South Park grew, all thanks to gentrification mind, more and more people became regulars there. Soon, the goth kids were no longer worth the space they took up, for $10 worth of coffee for a few hours and nothing else, it was better just to free up their table.

But it was their table, she couldn’t just kick them out! But she did. And so they had to find somewhere else to get their fix. The only other place in town, since it wasn’t a viable plan to keep stealing Henrietta’s mom’s car to go to the next town over, was the dodgy but preppy Tweak Bro’s Coffee House.

“Yeah well let’s just go in already, I’m getting cold!” Pete was the first one to make a move actually into the shop, pushing open the door gingerly, only to hear the obnoxious sound of the bell above the door -

“Gah! - Good afternoon, welcome to Tweak Bro’s Coffee House” the boy behind the counter looked up at the sound, wiping down glasses as he did so.

Michael glared at him before pushing two tables together so that there was enough space for his fellow goths and sitting down, purposefully making noise scrapping the table legs on the wooden floor. He’d forgotten who Tweek was, god how could he have forgotten the brats name, of course he’d work there. Michael did not like Tweek, although they’d never spoken. To him, the anxious blonde was an annoyance, a complete loser just begging to fit in with his gang of oddballs.

In actuality, as much as he hid behind the idea that Tweek was too conformist to be likeable, he genuinely didn’t like him at all, Michael was one to hold a grudge and he still remembered in 4th grade when him and Craig had had a huge public breakup and dragged his name into it. He hadn’t been there at the time, instead he’d been smoking outside of the school as per usual, unfortunately Henrietta had been the first to hear the whispers of the Michael that Craig had been involved with.

There wasn’t another Michael at their school, a Mike yes, but only one Michael, and it was him so, without telling him, Henrietta had assumed that it was him and that he was gay. The others had found out too but not from her, they were nothing if not loyal after all.

The worst part was that he was gay, he was beginning to work it out at the time but he was not in the slightest was ready to confess it to anyone else so being outed by a rumour that he’d aided someone with cheating, it wasn’t good.

It had turned out well though.

No one really cared, it seemed like not that many people at school assumed it was him since barely anyone actually knew his name, just that he was goth. He told the others at one of their nightly hangouts at Henrietta’s house, after they’d tried another spell from the internet, this time to hex the football team. They’d read some poetry and were just about to call it a night when he decided to just get it out in the open.

“I know you’ve heard about Craig and Tweek’s fight a few weeks ago, it wasn’t me. I don’t like with Craig enough to hook up with him. I am gay though.”

“Cool,” Pete had said and flipped his hair.

“Being straight is for conformists anyway,” Henrietta had added, though neither of the other boys had reacted insulted at the idea that that made them conformist, so maybe he wasn’t the only one.

Firkle had hummed, “Yeah but if you’d actually been an ass-hole and hooked up with him, that’d be totally lame man.”

And then they’d fallen back into comfortable quiet to their dim post-punk music, it was nice. It was really nice.

In the years since that, both Pete and Henrietta had begun to write some poetry with illusions to love, always keeping the gender of the subject vague. It had actually improved both of their poetry a lot because it gave them more passion, just writing about sadness can get boring but writing about the throes and hardships of romantic feelings being unrequited or suppressed, it brought variety.

He was still pissed though, Tweek had dragged him into a situation he wasn’t ready for and had never even apologised for it, that was pretty fucking selfish in his opinion. Oh well, it seemed to have worked out for him if the only other customer in the coffee shop was any indicator, a boy in a blue chullo hat, typing on an old laptop covered in stickers and occasionally stopping to write something down, probably doing homework or something.

Tsst, conformists.

Pete made to order the coffee while the others took a seat, he looked up at the menu and was confused by the names of the coffee that the shop offered, they all had pretentious names and were called brews, blends and roasts instead of just being called “coffee”.

“Uh can I just have two pots of coffee, black please?” Pete usually ordered or spoke to people on behalf of the group when he went out because he was least likely to be rude.

“Y-Yes, that’ll be $8” Tweek pinged the cash machine as Pete gave him the change from his pocket.

At least the place was quiet, though there was a no smoking sign on the bulletin board, which was definitely a negative. They could sometimes get away with smoking in the diner even though they were all obviously far too young to smoke legally, Firkle started smoking when he was 4 for christ’s sake. Sometimes though they’d have to smoke in the car-park which wasn’t too bad unless it was snowing. None of them ever tended to dress well for the weather, too cold in winter and too hot in the small slither of summer they got in South Park.

There was a gap between the coffee house and the cinema that that should be alright to smoke in, hopefully. It’s not like anyone was really likely to stop them, people mind their business if they know what’s best for them after all. It was probably an upgrade from the diner’s car-park though he was still pissed that they had had to move to this gay ass grandiose cafe.

Pete sat down just as the others pulled out their notebooks, ready to start writing poetry for them to read that evening, it was quiet except for the scratch of paper and pencil.

Michael lowered his eyebrows and began to slowly grind his teeth in frustration, he was trying to write and it had to be good god dammit but he couldn’t stop thinking about the distressed blonde making their coffee and his conformist jock boyfriend.

Sure, everything had turned out fine but it could have not turned out fine! Selfish prick. He was so close to just yelling at him, they were the only people in the shop really, the worst thing that could happen would be that Craig intervened and tried to beat him up or something but it would be worth it to finally banish the feelings brewing under his skin. He scribbled his poetry with even more anger. He was trying to keep it under control but was obviously failing as Henrietta nudged him gently, concern on her face.

He grunted at her and jerked his head in the direction of Tweek, she understood exactly what he meant, realising now why he in particular was opposed to coming here. Tweek was almost done with their coffee. The machine having just clicked off, he filled the pots almost to the brim and set them down on the table for them, “Enjoy,” he said before going to sit with Craig. He was confident that he wouldn’t have another customer until the post-work rush.

It was kind of awkwardly silence except from the quiet, distant nattering between the two lovers; the goth kids weren’t really used to it, at the diner, they’d rarely been the only ones there and if they had, one of them had used their phone to play some actually decent music over the trash playing on the radio. Here there was no radio and they couldn’t afford to get kicked out over something so small.

Eventually, once they’d each written a few short poems, talk resumed, at first about what they’d written (though not full recitals because that came later) and then more about what had been going on in their lives. They rarely spent time apart from each other but sometimes a member was dragged away with family somewhere, like the memorable time that Henrietta had fought the vamp kids at Casa Bonita, that was pretty cool. Sometimes they had stories from the few classes in school that they actually attended - Just enough to not get anyone expelled, not too many to ruin their reputations as people who don’t give a fuck.

Once they’d almost drank all of the coffee, Tweek noticed and came over.

"Is everything okay?" Tweek asked, fiddling with the hem of his shirt.

"Fine," Michael snapped, obviously not fine, while conversation about inane subjects and poetry had dulled his temper a little, it was still there, he just couldn’t stop thinking about it all, how badly that could have gone.

"Are you sure?"

"I said we're fucking fine, god why don't you leave us alone?!" in response, Tweek squeaked and backed away a little.

At this, Craig stood up from his residence in the corner and came over to see what the hell was going on.

"Why are you being a dick?" despite maintaining normal monotony, his eyes were slightly downcast; no-one upset his boyfriend and got away with it, which meant he got into a lot of fights because his boyfriend was quite easily upset.

"I’m not," he spat before turning back to his cliché, "I'm going for a cigarette."

His expression as he stood up and pointedly stomped out made it clear that they should not follow, when Michael got like this, it was best to just let him blow it off, a cigarette or two usually did the trick. However, Tweek seemingly did not pick up on this because, after muttering a few words to the still pissed off Craig, walked right on out after him.

It didn’t take him long to find him, one foot up against the wall he was leaning on, secluded by the Cinema’s awning, he looked cool and menacing, for a second Tweek considered just leaving him there to smoke, it’s not like he wanted to get any closer to that death stick, but he’d been making an effort to be more assertive and this guy clearly had a problem with him for some reason. He watched and waited.

The weather had turned a bit for the worse, the air now nipped at the back of Michael’s neck, he wished he had brought a scarf with him, luckily, the cigarette in his hand gave some warmth, each drag mellowing him out a little bit. Unluckily for him, he’d barely lit the cigarette before his peace was disturbed as he noticed none other than the subject of his annoyance, spying on him like a creep.

“What the fuck do you want?” He took breathe of smoke, as if to punctuate his accusation, accompanied with his signature glare.

“What’s your problem with me man?” Tweek slipped from his position partially hidden by the cafe’s wall and moved closer, trying hard not to twitch and seem weak as he confronted the other.

“What’s MY problem?! That’s fucking rich.”

“Gah! I don’t know what you’re on about!” Tweek hated how everything he said sounded hysterical but he was really confused, god, _he’s going to kill me._

“You outted me, asshole! God, you’re stupid,” he was sure he was going to need another fag after this, he wasn’t really expecting the boy to be this dense.

The blonde did truly look confused, his eyes widened in shock “... What?”

“My name’s Michael,” he thought that would be enough to jog his memory but seemingly not, god this was fucking annoying, he didn’t want to have to spell it out, it would be humiliating to say the least.

“... You go to the same school as me right?”

“Yeah! Captain obvious!” Michael felt a sharp pain as he realised he’d finished the fag, the butt smouldering in his hand and burning his fingers, he threw it to the ground and ground it under his foot, “And when you had a fight with your boyfriend, people thought _I_ hooked up with him."

“Oh.” _Oh “_ Oh god I’m sorry! That was years ago, I-I, didn’t even realise there was a Michael at our school, I’m sorry.”

_Tsst. Fucking idiot._

“Yeah well everyone found out that I’m gay. So thanks.”

“I’m really sorry man, I just panicked at the time, I wasn’t thinking, I’m sorry,” Tweek felt his stomach churn with guilt, sure, being seen as gay before realising he actual was was difficult but being outed when you _are_ gay must be worse, “Can I make it up to you?”

Michael wasn’t expecting that. He was either expecting him to explode with more defences or just cry, he thought fast, “Free coffee. We can’t go to the diner for our coffee any more, so free coffee.”

“Hgghh, my parents will kill me if they find out.”

“You’re choice,” it really wasn’t, morally, he kind of had Tweek in a choke hold.

“... Okay, coffee. Yeah, I can do that.”

Silence fell again but Tweek didn’t leave. Michael lit another cigarette, damn he barely had any left, luckily he new someone by Skeeter’s Bar who sold them and didn’t care that he was obviously a minor.

“Were you okay?” taking a few steps closer to the goth boy, Tweek wasn’t content to just accept the deal, he wanted to know what his careless mouth had caused.

It took Michael off guard too, not that he showed it in his face, maintaining his façade of nonchalance that he tried to hard to maintain when it wasn’t interspersed with bouts of anger. He didn’t really know what to say. Yeah, it _had_ been okay in the end but at the time, it was scary, he didn’t know who thought what of him. He was already used to getting picked on for how he dressed but what if people bullied him for being gay, he wasn’t Tweek or Craig, he wasn’t a yaoi character, it wasn’t the same.

And when barely anyone really noticed, he realised how invisible he really was. He was just one of the goth kids, no-one even knew his name. And that sucked ass. As much as he didn’t care what the conformist jocks and fake bitches at his school thought of him, it hurt to realise that no-one even thought of him at all. It had birthed some of his best poetry though.

“It was fine,” was he really going to tell this dork about his _feelings?_ “I mean, it wasn’t, it was totally lame what you did, but nothing really happened. Henri was the first to hear about it, then Pete, then Firkle. They all recognised my name but they didn’t mention it. But I knew they knew. They were fine with me being gay though, I would have sacrificed their blood in a ritual if they hadn’t.”

Tweek edged even closer, perching on the wall just far enough away that he didn’t inhale any of his smoke, it was a clear sign that he was listening. Someone other than his friends was listening.

“I told dad a few weeks ago. He didn’t care. I haven’t told my step-mom though, she’s kind of traditional,” he shrugged, hiding the fact that he was genuinely dreading telling her, she already wasn’t a big fan of him because of the music he listened to, the way he smoked and dressed and people he hung out with.

He wasn’t angry any-more, which was kind of strange, he usually didn’t calm down this easily, then again, just talking about it all made him feel less justified in his anger, it was years ago after all and using his name had been an accident.

“What about you?”

“Huh?”

“Like, you parents, how’d they react?”

“Oh! My parent’s think having a gay son is good for business. They never really had a problem with it, they let Craig stay in the store to do work without buying things because it makes them look good. It’s stupid but I hate how they always introduce me as their “gay son” and when the town first thought I was gay, my dad said that he was glad that I wasn’t _just_ a spaz!”

Tweek got a little worked up thinking about it, pulling at his hair and twitching. He didn’t like being called a spaz, it’s not like he could help it, he has ADD!

“Oh my god no way, that’s fucked,” Michael actually felt some sympathy for the kid, being a token for your parents to parade around was almost as bad as having your parents call you emo.

“Yeah!” Tweek pulled at his hair more violently, “Craig had it worse though. His dad wasn’t happy about it at all, he “didn’t want a gay son”, which is dumb because at least he can’t get anyone pregnant!”

Michael actually chuckled at that. He noticed how Tweek was still tugging at his fair and wondered if he even realised what he was doing. He gently placed his hand on the other’s and wordlessly guided it away from his scalp, saving it from further injury, sure it was a weird thing to do but wasn’t weird totally non-conformist?

Tweek looked up at the black haired goth, surprised by the affectionate gesture and smiled wearily, “T-Thanks man.”

He shrugged, “Parent’s are stupid. Most people are just going to grow up to become carbon copies of them, living the same 9-5 life and then dying of a heart attack at age 75, having done absolutely nothing except traumatise their kids and care about bullshit,” he said as if it explained everything, or anything at all, “Not me though, once Firkle’s finished high school, we’re all getting the hell out of this redneck shit-hole.”

Tweek didn’t really know what to say to that, so just stared into Michaels dark eyes, bewildered what that had to do with him.

“I don’t think you’re going to become your parents, doubt Craig will either,” _Oh,_ that was actually very sincere.

“Thanks!” he beamed, “I’m hoping that the only thing I inherit from them is my love of coffee and not my dad’s aimlessness or my mom’s spinelessness. I hope that works out for you.”

“Are you going to leave?” he smiled a little.

“Ah! No, probably not, it’s too much pressure! I hate travel. I’d leave if Craig wanted to but I don’t think he cares that much,” Michael nodded at this, “Plus I’ve got the shop! I basically run it at this point anyway”, that last part sounded a bit jaded, running a coffee shop at that age sounded like an absolute chore.

Maybe Tweek wasn’t that bad, he was gay, liked coffee and had a bad relationship with his parents. He might even make a good goth, mhm. Michael pondered on that for a bit as he finished the cigarette before extending the pack out to Tweek, an offering.

“No way man, those kill!” Tweek even shuffled back a bit, as if being in such close quarters to the carton might give him cancer.

So not a goth then, maybe a loser vampire, or worse, an _emo_ but not a goth. Somehow, this didn’t make Michael feel any sort of animosity towards him, it was weird, just ten minutes ago, he’d been fuming but now he kind of liked the guy, at least that would make frequenting his shop a lot easier, speaking of, he noticed how much the drop in temperature was making Tweek shake, after all he didn’t even have a jacket on.

“Let’s go inside, you can forget about the free coffee.”

“Hgh - Okay.”

After that, the subsequent visits to Tweek Bro’s Coffee House were notably more enjoyable, by the end of the month, they were probably considered friends. When they entered through the door, they’d great Tweek politely, they didn’t even need to order since he new what they’d want.

Later that evening of their first visit, Henrietta had asked what had happened, he’d brushed her off, “He’s not too bad, still a conformist but I dunno, I think he’s alright.” Of course it was weird for him to think so highly of someone who wasn’t goth or at least gothic like Mysterion, but his friends were polite enough not to push it. God he loved his friends so much, he would totally end the world for them.

Sometimes, when it wasn’t busy, Tweek would pull up a chair and chat with them, bitching about his parents or friends or school or whatever, joining in on their conversations and listening to them complain as well. He even wrote some poetry sometimes, it was far too positive for their poetry nights but it wasn’t awful, just a little clumsy but with charm. If Craig wasn’t busy, he’d come over occasionally as well, though he rarely said anything, just sitting with his boyfriend, holding his hand.

The way that they worked together, seemingly understanding each other’s every edge, flaw and hangup, like they could reach each other’s mind made Michael kind of jealous. He wished he could have that kind of relationship with someone but maybe it wasn’t really necessary, his friends understood him, maybe they’d even hold his hand if he asked.

When they got out, he could live his life exactly as he wanted but he admired the peace among the chaos that the couple seemed to have found.

And besides, when they were the only ones in the shop, Tweek let them use the radio he kept under the counter to play whatever they wanted, and they’d sometimes dance together, goth dancing of course. Craig seemed to like their music too. It was nice.

It was much nicer than the diner. 


End file.
